Modern internetworking and related technologies allow beneficial communication, file sharing and other useful applications. Electronic mail (email) comprises one such application, and one that developed relatively early and has become very popular, well established, and practical. As such, email today is, in some respects, a relatively mature medium with respect to technology, expediency, and scale, e.g., rather widespread familiarity, use, etc.
Somewhat more recently developed and implemented applications include Internet Protocol (IP) telephony and Instant Messaging™ (IM™). Both applications are now popular and fast growing. IP telephony allows the transmission of telephonic communication including voice calls, video conferencing and other real time communication over networks, channels, media, etc. in which data is exchanged using Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) and Universal Datagram Protocol (UDP), etc.
IM allows computer conferencing between two or more parties via the Internet. As its name implies, IM allows an on-line user to be notified upon another person, listed with the user's computer, coming on-line, such as for establishing effectively immediate dialog therewith. Messages, which are typically text based, can be sent between the internetworked computers, effectively linking their users in real time.
IP telephony typically includes Voice over IP (VoIP) transmission on wide area networks (WAN), private intranetworks, etc. and Internet telephony on the Internet and the Internet backbone of telephone carriers (although the terms are sometimes used interchangeably). IP based telephony (e.g. packet switched) provides users with several advantages over conventional, non-IP based telephony (e.g. circuit switched). The advantages of IP based telephony typically relate to feature availability and economics.
These advantages include newer features available with IP based telephones and networks, which non-IP based telephones and the “plain old telephone system” (POTS) are simply not able to provide. Other advantages relate to cost savings, for instance on calls to distant locales. In some cases and/or for some users, the benefits of IP telephony are so significant that the medium is effectively displacing, supplanting, replacing, etc. traditional telephony.
IP telephony is thus becoming a popular, well established and practical application, in some ways much as email has. And in some ways, the popularity of IP telephony promotes the use of IM, which has also become a popular medium in its own right. For instance, in some modern business practices, IM can become a catalyst for direct voice communication using IP telephony, such as where IM is used to determine whether a party is available by IP telephone.
The advantages of IM and IP telephony, such as the relatively low cost to place a VoIP telephone call, are contributing to the popularity and usefulness of the media. IM and IP telephony have typically been operated in relatively closed network environments, e.g., networks with restricted use, availability, etc. and/or with call sources well defined and identifiable, which has so far effectively deterred the rise of mischief and misuse of the media.
However, as IP telephony and IM become more popular and the advantages inherent in the media are to be more fully realized, these applications are increasingly being used in more open network environments. Unfortunately, this opening can lead to a rise in misuse of these media. Thus, as IM and IP telephony are increasingly used in open network environments, users may receive more unsolicited and typically unwanted calls and messages.
Like the “spam” e.g., unsolicited emails, which vex and annoy many email users, unsolicited, typically unwanted and possibly annoying calls and messages may vex and annoy IM and IP telephony users. Such unsolicited calls on IP telephone media are referred to as “SPam over IP Telephony” (SPIT). Unsolicited IM™ messages are referred to as “SPam Instant Messaging” (SPIM). The email spam problem is well understood and may relate to SPIT and SPIM.
The practicality and availability of email, along with aspects related to its scale, and/or maturity combine to help make email a low cost medium. For instance, costs associated with sending an email message are effectively negligible with respect to other economic considerations relating to networking and associated communication and computing technologies. In some respects, the effectively negligible cost of email messaging is extraordinarily beneficial.
Email for instance thus provides a virtually cost-free medium for contacting other people. In fact, the low cost of sending email can be extended to achieve even greater economic benefit by sending a particular email message to more then one recipient. The email message can be sent, for instance to large numbers of recipients, effectively simultaneously. Groups of virtually any size can effectively be sent the same email message at the same time.
However, this mass-transmission capability of email, coupled with its very low cost per message, cost per recipient, etc. and related economies of scale are associated with misuse of email as a medium. For instance, unscrupulous advertisers commonly exploit email's advantages to send unwanted, unsolicited, and typically annoying messages en masse via the medium. Such troublesome email messages comprise spam and significant effort is made to deter them.
IP telephony and IM now enjoy many of the economic and other benefits associated with email. As IP telephony and IM are increasingly used over more open networks, it is not surprising that SPIT and SPIM are respectively becoming significant problems for IT telephony and IM users. The costs associated with SPIT and SPIM, like those associated with spam, are significant in terms of annoyance and vexation, lost productivity and useful information that is lost.
Information can be lost due to SPIT/SPIM for instance where calls and/or messages are obscured, obfuscated, or obliterated with SPIT/SPIM and/or in an effort to remove SPIT/SPIM from a user's phone, computer, etc. For instance, where a voicemail box associated with a user's IP telephone fills to capacity with SPIT, a “good,” e.g., “real,” “wanted,” etc. call may be missed. Further, the user may still have to act to delete the SPIT before “good” calls can be received.